


Can't Hold Myself Back

by Catchclaw



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Canon Divergence: Steve Doesn't Go to War, Infidelity, M/M, Pining, Post-World War II, Pre-Serum Steve Rogers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-02
Updated: 2018-09-02
Packaged: 2019-07-05 22:03:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,446
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15872595
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Catchclaw/pseuds/Catchclaw
Summary: After the war, everybody starts settling down, which is fine by Steve. Until it's Bucky.





	Can't Hold Myself Back

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt: I had convinced myself I was in love with someone else. Prompt from this [generator](http://colormayfade.tumblr.com/generator).

There was a knock on the door in the middle of the night. It was kind of a polite knock for three in the morning, the darkest hour farthest from dawn, and Steve wouldn’t have heard it if he weren’t sacked out on the couch in front room instead of curled up in bed in the back. But he couldn’t sleep, hadn’t been able to get a straight eight for a week, so that night, he hadn’t even tried, hadn’t kept up with the pretense of climbing under the covers and pounding the pillow just so with his fist. He’d just peeled down to his boxers and grabbed the blanket from his bed and head out for the settee and the warm glow of the radio dial. Sometimes listening to music helped, or the news; now that the war was over, V-J Day come and gone, he could listen to the news again without feeling sick, without his heart breaking out in hives.

Bucky was home. All the boys that had made it were, and it was easier now to accept that he hadn’t been over there, that they hadn’t let him defend his country, that the war had been won without him, thanks, Mr. Hitler sent to its ash heap. If Steve’d been there, it wouldn’t have made any difference, good or bad. It was all over; the good guys had won.

And now the good guys were settling into civilian life, triumphant. They were getting desk jobs in the city and buying big houses out in New Jersey and picking out the prettiest Bettys to carry out there with them to be their wives, to make babies with, to make up a whole new kind of world. Almost all the old gang from the neighborhood was gone now, the ones that had made it. There’d been a flurry of weddings in those first months, late ‘45 and early ‘46; Steve was still shaking rice out of his shoes, still finding wedding favors crushed in his jacket pockets, still smelling overripe flowers on his lapels. He’d been a groomsman a few times, danced with lots of bridesmaids, some of them beautiful, some of them willing, some of them taken with what they thought was his naiveté. He’d kissed a few, fondled a couple at their invitation, been felt up in his good suit in the back room at the VFW hall. But none of it had excited him, had gotten his motor running, though he’d tried to put on a good show, and it had amused Bucky to no end, Steve slinking back to the dance floor with lipstick on his teeth and his shirttails hanging out, his cheeks the color of the bridal bouquet.

“So?” Bucky would say conspiratorial, leaning back hard on his heels. “She the one?”

And every time, Steve would wipe his mouth with his handkerchief and roll his eyes. “Not hardly.”

Bucky would laugh and pitch close to him, smelling of cheap gin and sugary cake. “You’re too picky is your problem, Rogers. Eventually you’re gonna just have to choose one.”

“Why?” Steve would say. “You haven’t.”

“Yeah, well, don’t use me as your poster boy, punk. I ain’t exactly Mr. Hearts and Flowers.” He’d waggle his eyebrows. “I like to sample every thing on the buffet. Can’t hold myself back to just one.”

And Steve had believed that, taken some comfort in it, the idea that Bucky would never get hitched. It was a far-fetched thing to imagine: his best friend swearing fidelity to one skirt for the rest of his life. Bucky was too big of a flirt; he liked women too much. He liked fucking. He liked meeting a girl at six and having her legs around his waist by ten. He liked flipping up a new set of crinolines every night and sending their owners home happy, with a kiss and promise of another date, another good time. He liked flopping on to Steve’s bed, after, still smelling of Joy perfume and girl sweat and telling Steve too much, making him blush, laughing harder the redder Steve got.

Sometimes, he’d fall asleep in mid-story, his body finally catching up to his mouth, his head swallowing up half of Steve’s pillow, his bare chest a handbreadth from Steve’s back. Sometimes, they’d wake up entangled, Bucky’s arms stickier than an octopus, and Steve would be hard, harder than he’d ever been from a girl’s hand, from the brush of her breasts against his arm, from the heat of her mouth against his. He’d lie still, still still, like a possum, a dead duck, and it wouldn’t make a damn bit of difference because Bucky would be moving against him, sighing, shifting his hips in his sleep, breathing slow and deep into Steve’s ear. Sometimes, it was torture, laying like that, feeling so good, because it made him stare down in the dawn what he fought so hard not to see during the day, to know in the depth of the night: he didn’t want a girl, any girl, no softness, no babies, no wedded bliss. What Steve wanted was Bucky, his best friend, the recently returned, the not dead; he wanted to turn over on the tiny twin bed and tuck his mouth against Bucky’s neck and whisper _I love you Why can’t you see that What the fuck else do you want me to do_?

And sometimes, they were bliss, those mornings, because sometimes Bucky would hum against Steve’s shoulder and slip a hand around his waist, cup him good and firm through his boxers, paper thin, faded, and old. He wouldn’t say anything, Bucky, wouldn’t cough up a word; he’d just reach in and pull Steve out and play with him perfect, long, easy strokes of his hand. It’d happened a few times when they were kids, young and dumb, before the war, but now it was more regular, an almost-every week thing, and now Bucky rutted against him as he tugged at Steve’s cock, the bed squeaking and both of them gasping, neither of them with anything left to hide.

The first time Steve had felt Bucky come, felt that shudder and soft spread of heat, he’d let out a sound like he was dying and shot so hard it’d caught on his chin. Bucky had grunted, a low, desperate whine, and given up another pulse, his cock jerking against the curve of Steve’s ass.

They hadn’t talk about it, after, not then. Not since. Hadn’t talked about a lot of things, it seemed like, because two months ago, Bucky had stormed in one night not with a girl, but with a small velvet box, now empty, and a firm wedding date.

“You met her,” Bucky had said, floating around the living room with his half-empty glass. “Rosamund, from Queens. Red hair, big bosoms. The maid of honor at Gloria Aldress’s wedding?”

“Oh sure,” Steve had said vaguely. “Yeah, right. She seemed nice.”

She’d seemed like all the rest, really. But clearly she wasn’t. Because Bucky wanted to marry this girl. Was going to. Had proposed and everything.

“Why didn’t you tell me before now?”

Bucky peeked up out of his gin. “Tell you what?”

“That you were serious about this girl. That you wanted to, ah--settle down with her. Get married and all.”

“I told you about her.”

“No,” Steve said. “You didn’t.”

“Sure I did,” Bucky said, breezy. “I know I mentioned her to you, kid.”

“Buck, if you’d ever said the word _marriage_ , I’d remember. Much less if you mentioned it in the context of one particular girl.”

“I brought her back here. You met her. I think you danced with her at the wedding, even.”

“That’s not at all the same thing.”

“If it’s the rent you’re worried about, Stevie, don’t be. Rosie’s dad is nicely set up, ok? Real nice. He’s gonna give us money to set up a new place and I told Rosie that some of that is gonna have to go to you to make up my half until you find somebody to replace me.” Bucky’d smiled, a little jagged. “I mean, it’s only fair. You can’t do that overnight, right?”

“Yeah,” Steve had said, lolling back in the armchair, feeling the knife twist but good in his heart. “Probably not overnight.”

Bucky hadn’t touched him for a long time after that, hadn’t come into his bedroom at all. They’d fallen into some weird routine of cordial; polite types, now, like they hadn’t been friends their whole lives. Part of it was that Rosie stopped by all the time now, when she was ‘just in the neighborhood.’ There was always a pretense to it--some question about the church or about the guest list or about the exact shade of Bucky’s good suit--and Steve couldn’t figure out if Rosie was fooling herself or trying to fool him. He was under no illusion about why she was there. Didn’t mean he was gonna leave, though, was gonna pick up his book or his sketchpad and head out into the Saturday afternoon rain just because she wanted to her fiancé to fuck her.

“But Steve’s here,” she’d hiss as Bucky tugged her off to his bedroom, her ballet-slippered feet dragging pleasantly on the floor, the damp edge of her skirt catching on the old carpet.

“So? He’s not gonna pay us any mind.”

A few kisses in, a closed door, and they’d forget all about him, make noise enough to raise the dead. Sometimes, he’d leave, walk down to the corner store slow and come back. Sometimes, he’d just turn up the radio. And sometimes, Bucky would let out a groan that would cut Steve down to his soul and he’d lock himself in the bathroom and beat one out into the palm of his hand.

Two months of this shit. And they’d never talked about any of it.

Except:

“I want you to be my best man,” Bucky’d said one night, late, halfway into a bottle. “Do you think you could do that?”

They were at the kitchen table, eating cold tapioca; Steve’d had a craving. He wasn’t drunk himself, but he was warm inside, toasty, the world a little brighter than it should’ve been. “If you want,” he’d said sloppy, around the curve of a spoon. “Sure, Buck. I guess.”

“You have to. I need you there. Gonna be scared out of my mind, standing up there. Can’t do it if you’re not right there.”

Steve had laughed. “Scared? You’re not scared of shit, _Sergeant_. Isn’t that what all the medals you brought home say?”

Bucky’d sat back, leaned his chair on two legs. “Fuck no. All they say is that I was scared shitless and made it home anyway.”

“That’s not it.”

“It is, too. You’d know that if you’d gone over.” Bucky’s eyes had dropped, fallen hard into Steve’s. “If they’d let you, I mean.”

The pudding turned lead in Steve’s mouth and it got hard to swallow; he reached for the bottle, tipped it full over into his glass. “Forget it. You’re right. How could I possibly fucking know?”

A hand on his arm, a hard squeeze. “Stevie. Hey.”

“What?” There’d been tears in Steve’s eyes, which just made him madder. “I said yes, ok? I’ll be your best man.”

“Honey,” Buck had said, soft, “what are you cryin’ about?”

“I’m not--don’t call me that.”

“Call you what? Honey?” Somehow, Steve was all at once moving; somehow, Bucky was guiding him by the arm, up and out of his seat, into the warm sink of Bucky’s lap, and god help him, he was going, he wasn’t fighting; he was turning his arms around Bucky’s neck and holding on for dear life.

“Yeah. I don’t like that.”

“Why? You’re as sweet as all that.” Bucky had one arm around Steve’s waist, another settled on the stretch of Steve’s back. “And as sticky, sometimes. Aren’t you?”

Steve had leaned his forehead against Bucky’s cheek, shivered. “Buck--”

“Hmmm?” Bucky tucked in closer, turned his head and nuzzled Steve’s throat. “What? You want me to stop?”

“You’re getting married,” Steve breathed.

“Yeah, I am.”

“You have--you can’t”--Bucky’s fingers had snuck beneath his undershirt and kissed the pale damp of his belly--“after that, we can’t--”

“Mmmm. After that, you’re right. We can’t. But before…”

“You love her, though, don’t you? Rosie?”

Bucky had hummed again, his palm swallowing Steve’s ribs. “I do.”

Steve moaned, felt his cock twitch. “But, but then how can you--?”

“Touch you like this?” Bucky kissed his cheek. “Get off on hearing you make these pretty little sounds?”

“Yeah.”

“Oh, Stevie,” Bucky’d said, in a voice so sad, so soft. “Don’t you know? I love you, too.”

They’d kissed for the first time that night, stripped each other, too; ended up in Bucky’s bed with its mismatched sheets and half-hearted pillows. Bucky had switched on the lamp and told Steve to watch and sunk his mouth down on Steve’s cock, pinned his hips and sucked him hard with no mercy, his face cut into a glorious smile. Then he’d set a jar of Vaseline on Steve’s stomach and fingered him open, working his own hips against the sheets, and when he’d finally pushed in, inch by beautiful inch, Steve’s eyes had gone wet again, blurry.

“Honey,” Bucky had whispered against his cheek. “Stevie, honey, am I hurting you? You gotta tell me. I’ll stop.”

Steve had clung to him tighter, clawed at his back and yanked at his hair. “Don’t you dare, Bucky Barnes,” he’d said fiercely. “Don’t you fucking dare.”

It hadn’t happened since then. They hadn’t kissed or said stupid things, hadn’t looked too long or nuzzled or touched. But then, Bucky hadn’t spent a night in the apartment since then, either; had made a habit of just coming by during the day while Steve was at work, packing up this thing and that.

It was probably better like that.

But tonight, the night before the wedding, Steve had come home to find a new suit hanging in his closet, dark dark blue and proper. A new shirt, too, and shoes. A note pinned to the collar:

 _11 am, Riverside Church. If you’re a second late, punk, I’ll kill you_.

There was no question, then, that there'd be no sleep that night.

He moved through the place in a daze--making dinner, eating it, scrubbing the dishes, brushing his teeth--seeing nothing, thinking nothing, his mind a maze of static, like the far end of the radio dial.

He’d be there in the morning, early. Of course he would be. With bells on. There’d be a bridesmaid on his arm and the love of his life at the front of the church, pledging himself to somebody else. He’d be there and it would burn, hurt worse than the time he had pneumonia and felt like he couldn’t breathe, like all but a sip of air had been stolen from him, like he was barely holding on to life. He would choke and he’d smile and he’d watch Bucky get married and not say or do a damn thing.

This was Bucky’s choice, not his, and he’d have to find a way to live with it. He’d have to. He would.

He stretched out on the settee in the dark and blinked into the eye of the radio, the smooth sounds of Glenn Miller running out into his ears. The notes were so close that he felt like he could reach out and touch, strum his fingers through "Tuxedo Junction," through that long, lovely "String of Pearls."

He didn’t sleep.

So when the knock came at nearly three, he was bolt upright in a moment, padding across the floor in the next.

“Who is it?”

“It’s me, Stevie. Open the door.”

“Buck?”

Bucky’s voice again, sharper now: “Open the goddamn door.”

In the light of the hallway, he was framed, a dark shadow, and in the next moment, Bucky was inside, the door slammed shut at his back. The room was pitch black.

“What’s wrong?” Steve said, a creep of fear up his spine. “Buck, what’s--?”

“I called off the wedding.”

“What the fuck? Why?”

Bucky laughed, a hoarse, ragged sound. “You know why.”

“Me? No, I don’t. What the hell are you talking about?”

“You _do_.” Bucky grabbed him, pressed him hard against the wall beside the coat rack. “You fucking do.”

“Are you drunk?”

“I’ve never been so damn sober in my life. Maybe that’s the problem, huh?”

Steve’s heart was a yo-yo, caught between trepidation and fearsome joy. “You’re not making any sense.”

“Well, if it’s sense you’re looking for, Stevie, you’re gonna be sorely disappointed because what I’ve just done demonstrates the exact opposite.”

“What do you mean?” He lifted his hands and found Bucky’s waist, as much to ground himself as anything. “Huh? Take a deep breath or something. Tell me what happened.”

“I told Rosie the truth, is what happened. I told her”--Bucky gritted his teeth--“I got mad and I told her that I’d made an awful mistake, the worst kind. The kind where you try and fool yourself, you know? I told her I’d convinced myself that I was in love with her, that I’d worked real hard at it the last few months and done a damned good job, too, but that at the end of the say, it was a put up job. I said I knew I should love her, that I was supposed to, that every sign in the whole damn world is pointing straight towards her but that every one of those fucking signs was wrong.” He let out his breath and leaned his forehead on the wall, his cheek brushing Steve’s. “I broke her heart is what I did, Steve. Took a crowbar to a stained-glass window, figuratively speaking.”

Steve smoothed a hand up Bucky’s back, felt the tremble there, the seep through of sweat. “I’m sorry.”

“I’m not,” Bucky said, fierce. “I mean, I didn’t want to hurt her, but there was no other way.” His mouth was at Steve’s ear now, his arms turned tight around Steve’s back. “I told you once that I loved her, and I do. In a way. I love the kind of life I thought we’d have together, the kind of life you’re supposed to want, you know? Wife and kids and everything.”

“Yeah, sure.”

“But I don’t want that. That’s what I finally told her tonight, what I finally let myself see.” He sighed, leaned a kiss on Steve’s jaw. “I want you, Stevie. I want whatever crazy patchwork life me and you have always had, the one we can put together piece by piece. I want to come home and find you here, or wait for you to get back; I want to make you breakfast and rag on you while you try to cook supper. I want to suck your cock in the shower and I want to put my head in your lap while you listen to _The Great Gildersleeve_ and I want to wake up with you in my arms for the rest of my goddamn life.”

There was water on Steve’s face, on his lips, and when he kissed Bucky, flush, he could taste them, salt mingling with toothpaste, with the warm sting of a cigarette.

They didn’t make it to the bed, stumbling through the early morning dark. Instead, Steve shoved Bucky on his back on the rag rug between the sofa and the radio set and they tore at each other’s clothes, Bucky pulling them both into his fist and jerking them sloppy, hard and fast and good. They kissed until they couldn’t breathe, until Steve let go with an ear-splitting cry and Bucky shushed him, chuckling, spurting up over his own fist as Steve shivered and shook back down.

“You have to return the suit, honey,” Bucky said, later, his breath hot against Steve’s hair.

“‘K. Haven’t even taken it out of the plastic.”

“You didn’t try it on?”

Steve scratched at Bucky’s chest, traced the soft skin over his heart. “No.”

It was quiet for a moment. “Would you have come tomorrow?” Bucky said finally. “Were you thinking about standing me up?”

Steve raised his head and looked down into Bucky’s face, streaked now with the coming dawn. “Honestly?” he said. “I don’t know.”

Bucky reached up and touched his cheek. “Well,” he said. “I’m glad you didn’t have to decide.”

Steve closed his eyes, kissed the inside of Bucky’s wrist. “Me, too, Buck. Me, too.”


End file.
